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Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case in European court

Search engines must remove the personal information of individuals from their search results if the request is reasonable, the European Court of Justice has ruled.

European Voice

5/13/14, 3:11 PM CET

Updated 7/4/14, 2:08 PM CET

Google will have to delete certain personal information that appears on its search-engine after losing a case at the European Court of Justice today (13 May). The ECJ ruled that internet search engines are responsible for protecting personal data that appear on web pages published by third parties.

Google had argued that it is simply hosting content and that the third parties are responsible for protecting personal data. The ECJ rejected that argument, saying that Google is equally responsible for the published content.

Search engines will now have to respond to legitimate requests from individuals to delete certain types of private information from their records. If the search engine refuses the request, the issue can then be taken to a data protection authority.

Google has raised fears that it will be inundated with requests, which could be followed by lawsuits if the requests are not answered in time. The ECJ specified that prominent individuals such as celebrities and politicians would not be able to make such a request, because they do not have the same expectation of privacy.

The case dates back to 2010, when a Spanish citizen complained that a Google search of his name came up with a Spanish newspaper article that contained personal information. A Spanish court referred the issue to the European court system because the complaint was based on the existing EU data protection law.

Viviane Reding, the European commissioner for justice, has been pushing the idea that EU citizens have a “right to be forgotten” on the internet. A revision of the EU’s data protection law is working its way through the EU legislative process.

Google said in a statement that the ruling was “disappointing”. “We are very surprised that it differs so dramatically from the [ECJ] advocate-general’s opinion and the warnings and consequences that he spelled out. We now need to take time to analyse the implications.”